On the advice of the “capitain du port” of Auxonne, we decided to aim for Trave. From Auxonne, Trave is upstream and north of Savoyeux. It would take us more than a days to get there even when considering driving from 9:00h to 19:00h, the operating hours of the locks. So we got up really early for our standards, and I went to get some baguette. On the way, I discovered a pastry shop that also sold baguette. With some baguette and much more confectionery like macron, petit fours, chocolate cake and what not, I headed back to the boat. And we managed to leave the port shortly before 10:00.
Around 1:30pm, hunger had reached a level that we no longer could ignore. Having seen other boat just anchoring on the riverside or mooring on a tree, we got really courageous and tried to do the same. The first attempt was unsuccessful, as the water level became to shallow. The boat began to softly plow through the muddy ground. We did not want to test our luck and looked for a different spot. Carefully, and with the stern pointing to the middle of the river (the inlet for the cooling water of the engine is on rear half of the boat) we slowly approached the shore. This time, everything was perfect. Felix jumped out of the boat and tethered the front of the boat to a tree. I then turn off the engine (to avoid mud being in sucked into the cooling system), and with a rope on the stern we pulled the boat to the river bank. All good, there was still enough water below the keel. We had done it — we had stopped “en sauvage”. I also jumped out of the boat to discover the “terra incognita”. We had stopped at a little copse through that a dried out creek runs. The vegetation was cut and pushed down — probably some camping anglers had setup their tents on this very spot not too long ago. After we had a cooked eaten a can of ravioli for lunch and some more investigation of our surroundings, we pushed the boat stern first back into the river stream and continued on to the next lock. We finished this leg of our journey in Gray where we moored for the night.
